


I Will Not Ask, Neither Should You

by neversaydie



Series: Like Real People [9]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Depression, Genderqueer Bucky, Genderqueer Character, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Non-Binary Bucky, Past Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Running Away, Steve Rogers Feels, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Steve Rogers is Passively Suicidal, breakdown - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-23
Updated: 2016-04-23
Packaged: 2018-06-04 02:10:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6636850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neversaydie/pseuds/neversaydie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The dirt at the side of a deserted highway isn't a beach, but that's where Steve is sitting when Bucky finds him. </p><p>"Room for two?"</p><p>He looks over his shoulder and nearly blinds himself with the sun's glare, the shadow unmistakably Bucky and not shielding him from the bright light. Steve turns back to look at his clasped hands, elbows resting loosely on his knees, and sighs just loud enough to be heard over the whining buzz of bugs and wind in the silent heat. </p><p>"Jesus."</p><p>[Bucky finds Steve, they decide to run away]</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Will Not Ask, Neither Should You

The dirt at the side of a deserted highway isn't a beach, but that's where Steve is sitting when Bucky finds him.

"Room for two?"

He looks over his shoulder and nearly blinds himself with the sun's glare, the shadow unmistakably Bucky and not shielding him from the bright light. Steve turns back to look at his clasped hands, elbows resting loosely on his knees, and sighs just loud enough to be heard over the whining buzz of bugs and wind in the silent heat.

"Jesus."

Bucky settles heavily in the dust and scrub grass (on his left, of course), all heavy boots and thick jeans and leather jacket even under the burning midday sun. There's a weight to him that wasn't there when he left, just a shade more muscle and a slight solidity to his movements that has replaced the fine tremor his flesh limbs had never managed to fully shake like a perpetual shiver. Steve glances at him sideways and notices the silver polish on his nails is fresh, shiny and unchipped and matching his metal hand like it's been coordinated. It would make him smile, if he had the capacity, because at least one of them has been taking care of themselves.

They sit in silence for a while, breeze cooling the tacky sweat at the back of Steve's neck and whipped-up dust occasionally forcing him to rub his eyes like he still gets allergies. There's barely an inch between their shoulders, but it might as well be a chasm for all the distance that lurks deep in the rift.

"What you doing?" Bucky asks after a long pause, casual like he's just come across Steve sitting on the curb squinting at something innocuous and wondering how to get it onto paper. Like when Steve would get off work a half hour before Bucky and wait outside the grocer's for him to knock off, and end up daydreaming so much he'd miss his friend's emergence from the stifling shop. Like back home.

"Sitting here." He shrugs, voice rough from disuse. The last rest stop was a long way back, when he'd ditched the latest 'borrowed' pickup because he figured it was still close enough to get traced back and returned to the owner. He's been walking since then, and who knows how long Bucky's been tailing him for.

"Before that?" It's so familiar, sounds just like when he used to make Steve admit he was sick despite his protests. _Did you eat this morning? No, but I didn't puke. And before that? …Shut up._

"I dunno." It's not that he can't remember, it just doesn't matter because he hasn't been doing much of anything really. Wandering, feeling too much, and finally drifting into not feeling much at all.

"Okay." Bucky seems to accept that, pulling his backpack off and digging out a water bottle that he holds out to Steve expectantly. "Go on. Your piss must look like beer by now."

It takes a minute, because everything feels slow since he got off the train and kept moving, but Steve reaches out and takes the water with a heavy hand. He's tired, he's been tired the entire time like the weight of his body is brand new again, and it takes a lot of effort to unscrew the cap and gulp down half the bottle when he suddenly realises he's thirsty. He's sick of the demands of his body, the constant need to fuel his metabolism and the gnawing hunger that never gets fully sated, so he might have been ignoring it out of spite. Or apathy. It's difficult to tell.

There's a protein bar being held out, ready for him to take by the time he comes up for air. It's strange, because Steve's been wondering if Bucky's been feeding himself, if he's been sleeping or showering or living indoors. And here he is, pushing food and water on Steve like he hadn't only recently had to be tube-fed again for a brief stint when he refused to swallow anything thicker than a cup of coffee. Like he hadn't been the one who disappeared after a mental breakdown, like he's the one with his shit together between the two of them.

Steve takes the bar with sluggish fingers and struggles to get the coordination together to tear open the wrapping and shove a bite in his mouth, and wonders if maybe Bucky _is_ the one with his shit together right now.

"You're different." It's an observation, not a judgement, and Bucky shrugs it off like they're just shooting the shit and none of this really matters. Steve can go with that, because it's about as much enthusiasm as he can muster up towards anything right now. Even choking down the protein bar is an effort he's not sure he can be bothered with.

"I'm not taking the drugs anymore." He says it just like that, blank and to the point. Sure of himself, like the strong, blocky print that had been the last Steve heard from him. "I'm still on the stuff against seizures, and the mood stabilisers and shit. But I'm not taking the ones to get the memories back. I don't want them."

"Okay." Steve doesn't fight him on it, doesn't even think to, because now he knows just how important it is that some things stay buried. Maybe Bucky forgetting some things has been a blessing, just as much as losing others is a curse. Maybe Steve's the only one who ever found it a curse, anyway.

"It, uh. I think it kinda helped to stop taking them and get away for a while. Put some pieces together on my own, without having old shit come up or following a template." He sounds like himself, almost, like he's apologising for storming out of the apartment after a fight and waking up the downstairs neighbours' baby with the door slam in their rickety tenement. "I know I should've… called."

"S'okay. I get it now, having to leave. Do some thinking." Steve shakes his head, closing his eyes to work up some energy for a second before he gulps down the rest of the water. He really is thirsty, he stopped paying attention to his body a couple of states back and he knows he's lost muscle and probably looks like shit by now. "Kinda what I meant to do, I guess. I just…"

 _I just ran out of cope_ , is what he wants to say, but it's still totally unthinkable for such an admission of vulnerability to actually come out of his mouth. Bucky is watching him from the corner of his eye, delicate surveillance that's not supposed to be detected, just like he used to when Steve got angry about something and would've torn the house apart if he thought Bucky was watching out for an asthma attack. He doesn't mind it now, the looking, because it's almost nice to feel like someone sees him without the shield.

He ends up not saying anything, just letting his sentence trail off into the loud silence of their surroundings and get taken away by the wind. It's around noon, from the sun beating down on their backs, and Steve would almost swear he can feel the water he just drank turning into sweat and making his dirty t-shirt cling to him even more. He can't remember the last time he took a shower or shaved, stopped bothering with motels after the first week or so when he realised he didn't want to look at Captain America in the mirror anymore. He sleeps better on the ground anyway, under the sky and stars and no surveillance.

Bucky doesn't seem to give a shit how he looks or smells, shuffling over a little so their shoulders end up pressed together. His button-up shirt is clearly feminine under the heavy jacket, lilac and floral-pattered with subtle cream lace at the collar, and Steve wants to burrow into his arms and hide his face in Bucky's neck and stay there until the rest of the world goes away. He'd be content to never open his eyes again if he could fade out to Bucky's heartbeat, which of course he can't because they don't _do_ that now, sleep together and cuddle and shut out the rest of the world, because everything is _different_ and _wrong_.

"How'd you find me?" He asks, when his thoughts get awful enough that he's willing to make the effort to speak so there's something else to listen to.

"Natasha called me about the cat, couldn't take him to Moscow with her." Bucky looks sheepish at that, and some part of Steve wants to laugh because Bucky was never an animal lover before. "She told me you took off, where you went off the grid. Weren't hard to find, not when you leave a string of good-natured car-jackings behind you."

"So much for her helping me disappear." Steve snorts wearily, unable to bring himself to give much of a shit, and Bucky frowns a little like he'd been expecting Steve to start spitting thumbtacks at the betrayal. He clearly already knows there's something off, but he's not saying anything about it.

"She hadn't heard from you for three months, she was worried." Bucky turns his head to look at him full-on this time, not disguising the way he looks like he's trying to see right through him. There's nothing to hide, anyway. Steve's given up on that.

"Three months?" It's a surprise to hear he's been gone that long. Steve usually has a good internal clock, but he supposes the days have been blurring together recently since he's been so tired. How long would he have spent wandering around America (and where is he, Iowa? Illinois? He's passed a lot of corn fields lately) if Bucky hadn't come to get him? "Shit."

"Yeah." Bucky agrees, holding his hand out for the protein bar wrapper. It's oddly endearing that he tucks it safely into his pocket, and for a moment Steve wonders if he gives a shit about littering or if he doesn't want to leave DNA evidence behind that they were here. He doesn't know a lot of things about Bucky, these days. "How come you decided to leave?"

Steve thinks he should feel something at the question. Some kind of dread at having to tell Bucky that his memory is confirmed, that terrible things did happen to him well before the war. But part of him knows that the only person who was clinging desperately to the relative innocence of their past was him, and that Bucky hadn't been fucked up by remembering the rape but by not being believed about it. He's tried to silence that part of himself with state after state of corn fields and silent drives, but Steve can't run forever. He's too tired.

"I… I didn't exactly decide. I ran." It's hard to force the words out, because he somehow doesn't want Bucky to know how rotten inside he really is. "I lost my temper and I thought I'd…"

He takes a shallow, shuddering breath, and then there's Bucky's hand on his back making him lose all his air again. Physical contact between them has been rare, a special occasion type of thing, and having the supportive touch now almost does Steve in right there in the dirt.

"I would've killed him. I thought I had, but I just got so angry I blacked out for a minute. It scared the shit outta me." His voice doesn't shake, but he wishes it would. He wishes he could conjure some kind of moral opposition or self-hatred about wanting to twist an old man's neck until his head pops off, but Steve just doesn't _care_ anymore. "Billy. I went to see him."

"Steve." Bucky sighs through his nose, the smallest reproachful sound that makes him think of dusty bare rooms and carbolic soap and the metallic tang of blood between his teeth. "Why'd you go and do that?"

"I needed to know." His lip does tremble at that, just for a second before he sucks it between his teeth and refuses the emotion. He's been so good at being blank, he can't lose it now. "I know, now. I would've killed him, Buck."

"No, you wouldn't." It comes back automatically, like he'd tried to tell Bucky the sky was green, and that makes it worse.

"I _would_." Steve laughs, a humourless bark that's more sob than anything else, because this is exactly what he hadn't wanted. "You think I'm good, but I'm not. Everyone thinks I'm good. But I'm just fucking scared. All I had left was the memory of home, what it was like, and then he wrecked…"

He has to drop his head this time, press his thumbs into the corner of his eyes either side of his nose until the prickling tears recede enough for him to choke out words without breaking down. He hasn't felt anything for so long that it shocks him when he finally does, and he thinks back to Bucky's phase of rocketing between crying or beaming at everything as he re-learned how to feel and thinks he gets it now.

"I wanted to kill him. I still do. I don't feel bad about that." He shakes his head, just a fraction. The wind picks up and blows some overgrown hair across his forehead, skittering like dead leaves on his skin. "I'm done with guilt. I don't care about any of it anymore."

"Guilt's a whole heap of bullshit, especially about murdering an asshole who deserves it." Bucky doesn't call Billy a rapist, but it hangs in the air between them until the wind blows it away all the same. "But you do care. That's who you are. Caring about shit that's none of your business is exactly how you got outta Brooklyn in the first place."

"No. I don't." He shakes his head again, harder and surer this time. "I don't want to be him anymore, Captain America. I don't care about it. They don't need me now, they managed seventy years without making me dance around for them and they can do it again. I'm done."

"That's the _biggest_ heap of bullshit I ever heard." That's one-hundred-percent original-issue Bucky Barnes, the tone and intonation and even the way his forehead creases incredulously when Steve looks at him, and that makes the dull anger in his gut suddenly sharp. Angry at Bucky or himself, probably not. More likely he's angry at everything _except_ the two of them.

"What?"

"Steve, you couldn't stay down if a ten ton weight was sitting on your chest." Bucky sounds like _himself_ , that's what throws Steve. Maybe he's just forgotten how Bucky sounded before the sleep deprivation started messing with him, or maybe he's forgotten more of home than he ever thought with how long he's been away, Steve just doesn't know anymore. "You're never gonna put the shield down while you think you could help someone with it."

"What if I don't want to anymore? What if it's not my job to save everyone?" Bucky's being gentle, not making fun or pushing his version of events, but the expectation suddenly makes Steve so angry that he shoves himself up from the dirt in a plume of dust and energy, and stalks away for a few steps before rounding back, never able to not have the last word. "Y'know what? I don't want this. I signed up to fight a war, nobody ever told me the war wasn't gonna end!"

"Steve—"

"I wanted to die for something worthwhile, find some way to make myself _mean_ something. And if I got out alive then I wanted to be with you and just go back to how things were for whatever shitty years I had left." Now that it's started to pour out, there's nothing Steve can do to stick his finger back in the dam and keep it together. "And then you fucking _fell_ and I let you, and I put that plane in the water because I couldn't stand to keep breathing when I thought you were dead. Everyone thinks I'm some kinda hero, but I was just looking for a way out that didn't hurt my conscience."

"You—"

"I never wanted to wake up on goddamn Mars and find out everyone I gave a shit about is dead!" He's red-faced and yelling at the top of his lungs and he doesn't fucking _care_ who hears him anymore. "I never wanted you to end up somewhere worse than death because of me! I never wanted to live past hitting the ice but I _can't fucking die_! I keep trying but it never _stops_!"

"Baby, _baby_." Bucky catches his arms when he tries to swing when he gets near, pulls him close as he tries to twist away and crushes Steve to his chest like he's still tiny as he vibrates with the pent-up emotion that refuses to be contained any longer. He tucks his chin over Steve's head just like he used to and grabs him with both hands, holding him steady as he tries to pull himself apart at the seam of every scar nobody can see because they heal away to nothing.

Bucky hasn't called him _baby_ since 1945. That's what pushes him over the edge.

"I wanna go home." Steve sobs, finally, sounding so small and so young and so fucking _sad_ muffled in Bucky's flesh shoulder, where he wished he'd never left since that morning Bucky left for England and nothing mattered after.

"I know." Bucky cradles him just like he used to, and that only amps up the pressure threatening to push tears out of Steve's stubborn eyes. He rubs his back like it's still small and twisted and hurts, and Steve lets out another sob because he feels small and twisted and hurt inside all the dumb meat that cages him. "I know, baby. I'm sorry."

"You saying that 'cause you mean it, or you just remember it?" Steve croaks, forcing the words around the lump in his throat. He thinks he'll finally lose it if this is another half-remembered action that Bucky carries out without fully knowing why. If he does this like he sometimes boils coffee grounds on the stove or hangs his laundry out the window to dry, if it's an echo like that then Steve doesn't know if he'll have anything left to live on. He's all out of everything.

"I mean it. I'd take you home tomorrow if I could." It's soft and not really like Bucky at the same time it's exactly like Bucky, and that's everything Steve needed to hear. "You ain't been looking after yourself, have you? You got into a pit again and nobody knew how to pull you out."

"You left. I thought I lost you again." It's like he can't stop himself now, not when he's close enough to feel Bucky's pulse and smell his skin, and Steve lets his tears sink into the floral shirt and doesn't even want to pretend it's the thin off-white of Bucky's work shirt back in Brooklyn. "I only just got you back and you were gone."

"Aw, baby. I'm so sorry." Bucky murmurs quietly, so soft they wouldn't be overheard even in a crowded room. There's no one around but the dust and a car that passed maybe twenty minutes ago, but it's private and just for them (against bugs, can't be tracked) anyway. "I'm here, I'm not going anywhere. We can make a home, a new one."

"That's not gonna work." Even as he pulls away to try and save some of his shredded dignity, Steve sniffles. He thinks that they can't both possibly be fucked up at the same time, that he needs to keep it together because Bucky isn't in his right head more than a quarter of the time. But standing here in the dirt and nothing with Bucky holding him tight enough to bruise, he almost thinks it might be okay to fall apart a little bit.

"I know. It's all we've got, though." Bucky's lips curl in a small, wry smile that Steve's known all his life. He used to wear it every time Steve was at death's door and Bucky was telling him confidently about all the stuff they were going to do once he got better, a talisman against stacked odds. "Hail Mary toss, if they still call it that."

"I don't know if I can do it." Steve admits, soft and cracked, as he stubbornly rights himself and scrubs a hand over his face that now seems unpleasantly stubbly. He'll have to wash and shave and take care of himself now Bucky's here, not that he _has_ to but that he feels like he has a reason to, suddenly. "Serve. Be the Captain. I don't know if I can do that anymore."

"So don't." Bucky shrugs, like that's a real option. Steve just stares at him. "You don't have to do anything, nobody owns you. That's what you keep telling _me_ , so it's gotta be true for real people like you, right?"

"Don't say it like that." He doesn't wince, not now he's desensitised (as much as he can ever be) to the way Bucky sometimes talks about himself like he's not human, but Steve's still not exactly happy to hear him speak like he's a machine. "But yeah, okay. You're right."

"So let's go be like real people for a while." Bucky looks a little desperate, just a little edgy despite how hard he's trying to look neutral, and Steve can't tell if it's because he's worried about him or because this is something he's been hoping for. To escape. "We've got the whole wide world, sweetheart. If you don't wanna be the Captain then I don't want you to either, God knows I didn't want you there in the first place."

"You remember that?" Steve repeats, not caring because Bucky repeats himself all the time and there's no reason to be embarrassed, not when it's just them. "Or you just saying it?"

"I remember." That's all he says. He doesn't say 'I remember the morning I left, I remember trying to hold onto the last smell and sight of Brooklyn and holding you and pretending to be brave and wishing I could stay, I remember telling you all I cared about was that you were safe and then you got your dumb ass involved and I tried to break your jaw when we were out of Austria', but Steve knows what he means. "So if you wanna go, then let's go. I'm better than Nat, I can keep us off every grid there is. They can't make you be him again, I won't let them. Not if you don't want it."

"I…" Steve swallows hard, tries not to feel sick and ungrateful for the sudden chance he has, but he's just so tired now his burst of angry energy has died that he can't think straight. He's scared to make the step, however big or small it might turn out to be. "I need to sleep."

"Yeah, you do." Bucky holds out his arm like he used to for dames and Steve doesn't even hate himself for taking it and leaning on him with most of his weight, because he's suddenly so drained he'd just lie here in the dirt otherwise. "We're gonna get you some sleep. Then we're gonna figure out everything else."

"You're not gonna leave." It's not a question, but Steve can't help feeling slightly embarrassed when he asks it so hesitantly on the stumbling walk to Bucky's car. It's a nondescript truck that he can't tell is stolen or not, a loud yowl from the back seat letting him know that Jager is very much with them in a cat carrier, hence the open window. "I'm not gonna wake up again and you're gone."

"I'm not leaving." Bucky promises, easing him into the passenger seat and even fastening his seatbelt for him. Which is nice, because Steve doesn't know if he could move his arms that much now he's seated and fading fast. "Sleep, baby. I'm gonna be here when you wake up, I promise. We'll work it all out then."

Any other question he might ask has to wait, because Bucky shuts the car door gently and climbs in the other side, and Steve is so overtired and overstimulated that he grabs Bucky's wrist for an anchor and nearly passes straight out. The last thing he knows is that Bucky starts humming _It's Been A Long Long Time_ as the engine kicks up and they start moving, and that's enough for him to let go. Bucky won't let anyone hurt him or take him or make him go back if he doesn't want to, and Steve intellectually knows he should be the one worrying about taking care of Bucky, but this is back to how it's always been so he can't find the will to object.

He falls asleep to the swish of wind in the cornfields and Jager's fussy trills and Bucky humming and never moving his wrist so Steve can hold it and feel safe. It's not home, but it's almost the same. It's almost like dreaming, like falling, and knowing he'll land on something soft because he's not alone anymore.


End file.
